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Bulletspeak

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

Together with EA and Epic Games, the Polish Painkiller developers People Can Fly are certainly doing their darndest to specifically target us connoisseurs with their latest Unreal Engine 3 game, Bulletstorm.

How, exactly, you may ask? Glancing over older press releases (frantic, adrenaline fueled, immersive) for Painkiller, the lingo has been amped up several notches: Symphony, carnage, blockbuster, unadulterated, entertainment, arsenal, outrageously, unprecedented, frantic, yell-inducing, inciting, mayhem, insane, execute, exaggerated, excited, onslaught, cutting-edge. 1)http://news.ea.com/portal/site/ea/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20100412006088&newsLang=en

(Only missing the good ol’ slobberknocker and barnburner, in other words.)

Good thing, then, that the just-released debut trailer below should back up some of that smack, too:

Below, a list of excerpts and examples of the aforementioned jargon in action:

  1. The developers are slated to deliver a “Blood Symphony of Gunplay and Carnage” packed with “blockbuster moments” 2)http://news.ea.com/portal/site/ea/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20100412006088&newsLang=en
  2. The developers “believe” in “making killing ridiculous enemies as awesome as possible” 3)http://gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/04/16/before-bulletstorm-there-was-painkiller.aspx
  3. Inspired by pulp and Heavy Metal, the company is collaborating with comic book author Rick Remender, “best known for his original pulp sci-fi series Fear Agent and his work on Dead Space” 4)http://gameinformer.com/games/bulletstorm/b/xbox360/archive/2010/04/19/inside-bulletstorm-writer-rick-remender-s-head.aspx
  4. The game places specific emphasis on the methodology of the kill: “special kills that reward players with increased upgrade points” 5)http://gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/04/26/killing-with-style-an-illustration-of-bulletstorm-s-skillshots.aspx
  5. The team “dubs the close combat in Bulletstorm ‘creative mayhem'” 6)Gameinformer May 2010, p48
  6. The company has also done away with the cover systems of today: “Bulletstorm … has no cover mechanism, and we’re turbo sliding 20 or so metres further than science’s popular ‘momentum’ would realistically take us.” 7)http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=245721

While Wolfire & co. have been shoving it to the mainstream in a slightly different manner, People Can Fly seem to be aiming to counter the current established shooter paradigm in ways that are reminiscent of the Death of Glam Metal!

The question remains, then – which side of the fence is glam metal on, exactly, and what about the Death of Grunge? According to Joystiq, EA have slated Bulletstorm for Q1 2011.

P.S.
Ulysses?

The question remains, then – which side of the fence is glam metal on, exactly? And what about the Death of Grunge?

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Interview with The Whispered World Designer Marco Hüllen

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

Note: This is Day 3 of “The Whispered World Week” at The Slowdown.

Maro Hüllen, with Pet

In today’s interview, we talk to the original designer and primary illustrator of The Whispered World, Marco Hüllen (on the right), in the hopes of shedding more light on the curiouser details of the development process of the game – especially, on details that are still left uncertain for non-German audiences.

After all, German fans of the adventure game have had the privilege of reading Marco’s posts on various adventure gaming forums – as well as having already played the game. For those of us not yet in the know, the interview below should hopefully reveal some further facets of the make-up of the wildly imaginative ride that is the six-year development process of the game.

Finally, please do remember to take a look at our introductory post to The Whispered World – the article, written in conjunction with this interview, details the game’s history from inception to conception, between the years 2004 and 2010, and should by all means get you better prepared for the game’s release on the 23rd.

A special thank you goes to the very genial mister Hüllen, who braved our questions despite a minor language barrier. Therefore, the interview has been translated, from German into English, by Martyn Zachary and Richard Scary for The Slowdown. The original answers, in the German language, will also be published on the website later.

The Slowdown: After having worked so long on a project that began way back in the first half of the 00’s as an university project, are you feeling any fatigue now that the game is finally coming out?

Marco Hüllen: A little, but the joys do outweigh the fatigue. When I first started work on the game, I never expected it to become such a marathon for me. Much has been enjoyable, and a lot was equally frustrating. In the end it all came together nevertheless, and with that in mind it has all been worthwhile.

How long have you been working on the game, exactly?

Oh, it has already been quite a few years: I started work in the year 2004, with The Whispered World as the topic of my diploma thesis. When I completed my degree in late 2005, I made the decision to develop the game further at Bad Brain Entertainment, for whom I had done graphics on some other titles during my studies.

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The Secret History of the Whispered World

Martyn Zachary 1 Comment

Note: This is Day 2 of “The Whispered World Week” at The Slowdown.

Nothing is permanent in this wicked world – not even our troubles. –Charlie Chaplin

Sometimes pictures are worth a thousand words. Other times, a video is worth these thousand words; once in a while, though, there comes a time when neither pictures, videos nor a thousand words can accurately portray a story.

One such story, in more than one way, is that of The Whispered World, an apocalyptic fantasy point and click adventure from Germany; apart from boasting an imaginative, existentialist storyline, it also comes with an origin story that is one of the wildest development rides for a video game in recent memory. 1)Other than, that is, Babylonian Twins (more…)

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1. ↑ Other than, that is, Babylonian Twins

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Multiple Middles in Alpha Protocol

Nabeel Burney Leave a comment

We haven’t said much about Obsidian Entertainment’s upcoming RPG-Shooter Alpha Protocol here at the Slowdown, tweeting updates on the game instead. I think what has kept us from being too enthusiastic is the confusing nature of the media coming out of Sega; an interesting weapons showcase is followed by a lame cinematic trailer, and so on. But what keeps me interested is the potential of the team behind the game. As I related recently, I’m a huge fan of Planescape: Torment, a 90’s RPG created by some of the developers who are now at Obsidian, including writer/designer Chris Avellone. So I’m hoping that the mixed messages are a result of sloppy marketing.

It wouldn’t be the only thing Sega’s screwing up: the game was initially to drop in October last year, but was then pushed back to “Summer 2010” without an announcement 1)http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3176247, only to be finally dated for May 28th in Europe, and June 1st in the US. Much of the team has already moved on to their next title, Fallout: New Vegas 2)http://www.gamebanshee.com/interviews/96452-alpha-protocol.html, also slated for this year.

So, Alpha Protocol. The “first modern day spy role-playing game” puts you in the shoes of Agent Michael Thorton on a covert ops mission to investigate terrorist activity and all that jazz. It seems to be more traditional with its RPG mechanics than most RPG shooters these days (which usually only go as far as incorporating “RPG elements”), featuring a full skills system allowing you to customize your character’s physical attributes and ability to use weapons and gadgets. Each ability tree can be upgraded with skill points with passive and active skill milestones. A point in the Pistols tree, for example, can improve accuracy with the weapon; one of the passive skills early on improves critical hit chances, and an example of an active skill is the Chain Shot, which momentarily slows down time to let you mark one or more enemies before your character executes an efficient series of shots to take them all down. It reminds me of the V.A.T.S. feature in Fallout 3, or perhaps the Mark and Execute feature in the upcoming Splinter Cell: Conviction.

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